HARRISONVILLE, Missouri: The older sister of a girl allegedly molested and impregnated four times by their father said Thursday their mother allowed the abuse and should face more than a child-endangerment charge.
"I want her to get more charges," the 20-year-old said outside a western Missouri courthouse. "I want her to pay as much as my father. I don't want either of them to get away with a slap on the wrist."
The mother is charged with one count of endangering the welfare of a child. Cass County prosecutors said additional charges were possible but declined to elaborate. The woman is free on $10,000 bond.
The Associated Press is withholding the names of the suspects and other family members to protect the identity of the daughter who was allegedly sexually assaulted. A judge entered not guilty pleas on behalf of the mother and father during their initial court appearances, prosecutors said.
The 47-year-old mother was allowed to miss a scheduled court appearance Thursday; a preliminary hearing was set for March 5. Her public defender, Angela Weatherford, declined to comment on the case.
Her husband, also 47, faces charges including second-degree murder in the death of a boy born in November 2006. The infant is believed to have died months later after not receiving medical treatment for pneumonia.
The baby's remains were found last month in a cooler on a rural property where the family once lived near Harrisonville, a town of about 9,000 people about 40 miles south of Kansas City.
Two other babies the man is suspected of fathering with his now 19-year-old daughter also died. Charges have not been filed in those cases.
The body of one of those babies was found in a different cooler last month on the Harrisonville property. The other infant is believed to have been buried in Oklahoma, where the family briefly lived.
A surviving child, a 3-year-old boy, is in state custody. The man also is charged with endangering the welfare of a child, statutory rape and two counts each of incest and abandoning a corpse. He is being held on $500,000 bond.
Family members and investigators have said the daughter who had the babies was 13 when the molestation started. She has not been charged with any crime.
